


Solace

by eerian_sadow



Series: Avalon [79]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers Generation One
Genre: Angst, Bad coping mechanisms, M/M, Mentions of canon character death, Suicidal Ideation, implied sexual situations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-05
Updated: 2008-09-05
Packaged: 2018-09-22 09:12:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9600029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eerian_sadow/pseuds/eerian_sadow
Summary: To push away sorrow, sometimes a mech needs physical reminders that they aren't alone.





	

He didn’t want to hate Elita-1, but circumstances made that difficult at best. It wasn’t her fault that her mate had been resurrected—he didn’t know how yet—and his had not. It wasn’t her fault—or Optimus’—that their dead leader had been resurrected and Prowl had not. He didn’t want to hate either of them—they were his friends, dammit!—but right now, he very much did.

He sat at the desk in the apartment he shared with Bluestreak and tried to figure out what to do. He had some Earth classical music playing in the background—Mozart to sooth his tension and quiet his mind—and one of Prowl’s old letters pulled up on his computer screen.

Primus, he missed Prowl.

He didn’t know how long he sat there, listening to his music and drowning in his renewed sorrow, but it was at least three hours before Bluestreak came home. The younger mech didn’t say anything when he saw Jazz; he simply changed the music to something harder and then wrapped the saboteur up in a hug.

“I thought the rumors were just that until I saw you,” Bluestreak said.

“I was there when he came in,” Jazz said softly, voice full of hurt and sorrow. “Elita and I were just sitting down for our morning energon and when I looked up, he was just standing there in the doorway. He looked so hurt when he saw me, like he knew what was wrong already.”

“I’m so sorry, Jazz. I wish you hadn’t found out that way.”

Bluestreak let Jazz pull himself out of his arms. “I know. I gotta get out for a while.”

“I’ll see if Sideswipe wants some company for a while. Go clear your head.” Blue’s expression was understanding.

Jazz turned toward the door. “I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

“We’ll manage without you for a few days if we need to.”

The saboteur nodded and walked to the door.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

He had no idea how long he walked or how far. He also had no idea where he was; Jazz could have been anywhere in Polyhex or Kaon when he realized that Ravage was walking with him.

“What are you doing here?” he asked the Decepticon. “Cybertron’s not the safest place to be a Decepticon right now.”

 _We heard about Prime. Soundwave was worried for you._ Ravage butted his head against the Autobot’s leg gently. _He can’t be here right now, so he sent me to make certain you were all right._

“I’m not all right, Ravage. I don’t think I’ll ever be all right again.”

 _You shouldn’t be alone right now._ Ravage butted his leg again. _Let’s go inside somewhere. Laserbeak said it was supposed to rain today._

Jazz wasn’t stupid; rain may have been in the forecast, but Ravage wanted to get off the street so that he they wouldn’t be caught together. Ravage would be executed almost immediately, and Jazz would be branded a traitor and locked up for the rest of his life at the minimum. He allowed the quadruped to lead him to a building that didn’t look too structurally damaged, simply gutted by fire. He sat down heavily on the blackened floor. Ravage lay down next to him and rested his head on Jazz’s thigh.

_Do you want to talk about it?_

He rested a hand on Ravage’s head. The fact that Ravage was willing to try to help him warmed Jazz’s spark. “I appreciate you asking, but no. Right now I just want… to be not alone.”

The Decepticon was silent for a long moment. _He doesn’t like being alone either._

“Any word on what happened to Shockwave? We didn’t find anything when we cleaned out what was left of the Tower.” The saboteur petted Ravage almost absently between the ears. It was something he had gotten used to with Steeljaw, and he found that it was tangible and comforting proof that he wasn’t really alone.

_No. I think that not knowing is harder on him than Shockwave being deactivated would be. I’m worried about him._

Jazz thought back to the cycles—and sometimes meta-cycles—before they had bonded that he had spent not knowing if Prowl was functional or not. Those times had been incredibly difficult, but he had always known that he could break his cover to be able to find out Prowl’s operational status; Soundwave did not have that option.

The only thing his friend could do was dig through the ruins and pray.

“We can be not alone together, then,” the saboteur said. “He and I were always good at that.”

_I hate this war. All it’s ever done is give the people I care about hope and then rip it away._

Jazz didn’t have a reply for Ravage’s decidedly non-Decepticon thinking. He simply continued to stroke the quadruped’s cranial plates and Ravage continued to keep the saboteur company.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

The saboteur came out of standby mode—he didn’t feel safe enough to go into recharge here, Ravage as his guardian or not—when the Decepticon’s head shot up off his leg. He followed Ravage’s gaze to the doorway, where Soundwave was standing.

His friend looked like he had just gone three rounds with Devastator and lost.

 _Soundwave, what happened?_ Ravage was shocked at his creator’s appearance.

Jazz came to his feet quickly and crossed the room to help his friend. Soundwave almost collapsed in his arms as soon as he touched the Decepticon. The Autobot maneuvered them carefully away from the door and lowered Soundwave to the ground. As soon as his friend was settled, Jazz began checking the damage.

“The damage is all external,” Soundwave told them. “I was attacked by a band of neutrals when I allowed myself to be careless. Their weapons were not strong enough to cause lasting damage.”

“Maybe not,” Jazz replied. “But you’re still going to need rest and repair.”

“I will be fine in a few joors.” Soundwave sounded more than just tired and hurt; he sounded defeated.

 _He won’t be fine, Jazz,_ When Ravage’s statement brought no reply from his creator, Jazz knew the younger mech was using a private comm frequency. _He won’t be fine and I can’t help him!_

 _I can,_ Jazz sent back. “Can you transform?”

Soundwave shook his head, too tired to speak.

“That’s okay.” The saboteur put a comforting hand on his friend’s shoulder. “I’m gonna go back to my place and get some energon for you.”

The Decepticon didn’t move, but Jazz knew his friend had heard him. He turned to Ravage. “Keep him safe while I’m gone.”

Ravage looked back at him with a desperation he hadn’t seen since he had come across Soundwave offline in a small Oregon forest years ago. _I’ll protect him from what I can._

Jazz hoped that would be enough. He nodded and left the building. When he stepped outside, he looked around, trying to regain his bearings and figure out where he was. He gave a weak smile of relief when he locked optics with Buzzsaw, who was nestled between two fallen walls across the street from him.

“I know you know where we are. Take me home so I can help him?”

He didn’t know whether the flyer would agree or not; Buzzsaw had never warmed up to him the way Ravage and Laserbeak had after he had rescued and repaired Soundwave in Oregon. The Decepticon studied him intently for a long moment before he replied.

_What makes you think he’ll let you help him? He wouldn’t let any of us fight with him. He wants to be deactivated now._

“So do I,” Jazz admitted softly. “But I can go on, because it’ll hurt the people that love me if I’m gone.”

_Will you hurt if Soundwave is gone, Autobot?_

“I’ve loved him since we were kids. Losing Soundwave would hurt almost as much as losing Prowl.” The saboteur felt a sting in his spark at the words—not just for Prowl, but at the thought of losing his best and oldest friend as well. “And we will lose him if you don’t help me help him.”

Buzzsaw didn’t make a verbal reply, but he did fly out of his hiding place. Jazz followed with relief.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Home had proven to be very close by, as the Decepticon flew. Jazz was both relieved and grateful; Soundwave didn’t really have a lot of time to be waiting for him.

The saboteur was pretty sure his friend had been slipping into system failures before he had left.

Jazz was no medic, but he had learned a lot about first aid and field repairs over the millennia. Anything he couldn’t fix, he could stabilize long enough to get Soundwave to a proper medic for. He wasn’t sure that the Decepticon would thank him for that, but he could save his best friend from his own self-destructiveness.

This time.

He grabbed the emergency repair kit he and Bluestreak kept in the sitting room—and the emergency rations stored with it—and ran back outside to Buzzsaw. The Decepticon was looking back toward the building they had left Soundwave and Ravage in.

_Ravage says he isn’t doing well._

“I know,” Jazz replied. “He wasn’t doing well when we left.”

Buzzsaw gave a keening wail. _You can’t let him die!_

“I ain’t gonna let him die.” The saboteur didn’t wait for the spy. He began running back toward Soundwave—and since he knew where he was going now, he would make much better time. Buzzsaw followed him without another word.

When he stepped back inside the burned out building, Jazz was stunned to see that Ravage’s description of “not doing well” was a horrific understatement. Soundwave’s finish was already starting to fade into the sickly grey of death. His visor was dim, and the only sign he gave of still being online was the sound of one of Woodwind’s symphonies playing softly over his speakers.

The Autobot wanted to break down at the sight, but he knew Soundwave would deactivate if he did so. He knelt down next to his friend and began his repair work.

 _Can you fix him?_ Ravage asked over the private comm.

 _I don’t know,_ Jazz replied, also on the private comm. _But I won’t let him go without a fight._

The saboteur knew that the spy had a thousand more questions and fears, but the younger mech stayed silent. Jazz paused in his repairs—which were going to be much more extensive than Soundwave had wanted them to believe—and put his hand on Ravage’s head for a moment. The Decepticon rubbed his head against the Autobot’s palm, accepting and returning the comfort.

Jazz turned back to his work. _You’re not dying today, Soundwave. They need you too much._ I _need you too much._

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

He didn’t know how long he worked on Soundwave before his friend’s injuries were stable enough that he could refuel him. The work he had done and the energon did wonders, though, and the Decepticon’s color returned to normal. Ravage and Buzzsaw had both been incredibly relieved.

 _Thank you,_ Ravage said. _None of us would have had the knowledge to save him._

Buzzsaw didn’t say anything, but Jazz could feel the flier’s gratitude as well.

He gave them both an exhausted smile, feeling like he had truly accomplished something that mattered for the first time in weeks. “You’re welcome.”

 _Get some rest,_ the quadruped added. _We’ll stand guard for you._

 _We owe you that much, at least,_ Buzzsaw added quietly.

The flier’s tone suggested that Jazz had finally broken through the barrier of suspicion that had hung between him and Buzzsaw for all the vorns the Decepticon had been online. He was sorry that Soundwave wasn’t online to see it.

“Sounds like a plan to me,” he said. “You guys can have the last of the rations if you need ‘em.”

Trusting that Soundwave’s sparklings would do as they promised and not deactivate him during his recharge cycle, he stretched out on the ground next to his best friend. He wanted to be close at hand if anything else went wrong.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

“Jazz.”

Soundwave’s voice pulled him from recharge as effectively as one of Blue’s nightmares would have. The grief his processor had been drowning him in made him forget where he was for a moment. “Soundwave? What?”

“You were calling for Prowl,” Soundwave said gently.

“Sorry if I woke you.” Jazz sat up and pulled his knees to his chest plate, resting his arms across them. He forcibly turned his thoughts away from his nightmare about Prowl and back to his friend. “It’s been hard since I lost him. And Prime coming back just made it worse.”

“I know.” Soundwave put an arm around the Autobot and hugged him against his chest.

Jazz allowed his friend to hold him, taking comfort in the fact that the other mech was healed enough to be online. Soundwave remained quiet as well, partly because talking hurt him and partly because they didn’t always need words between them.

“Jazz.”

The saboteur looked up into Soundwave’s too-expressive optics with surprise. He hadn’t known the Decepticon’s visor was retractable. The pain and desperation he saw in those optics was sparkbreaking. “Yeah?”

“Help me remember that I’m not alone. Please.” The Decepticon retracted his face mask as well, and pressed his lips to Jazz’s before the Autobot had a chance to reply.

His thoughts whirled, even as he kissed his friend back. He wasn’t the kind of mech to drown his grief by using another mech for pleasure, though Primus knew that Sideswipe had offered more than once. And, despite how long he had been gone and the fact that he was never coming back, it felt like it would be a betrayal of Prowl’s memory to be with Soundwave like this. But Prowl would have wanted him to move on, to find happiness wherever he could. And he and Soundwave _had_ done this once before, after Woodwind had been deactivated.

Jazz let go of his inhibitions and wrapped his arms around Soundwave. They both needed to be reminded of how it felt not to be alone, even if it wasn’t a permanent arrangement.  



End file.
